and ain't i a woman?: Cosmetic deceptions
Want "enhanced self-esteem, a more satisfying body image and personal gratification"? According to Sydney's L'Image Cosmetic Surgery clinic, all this can be achieved simply by undergoing breast enlargement surgery. Other "benefits" of cosmetic surgery are said to include "great personal satisfaction and well being".
The reality of cosmetic surgery, however, is radically different.
Cosmetic surgery companies make sure that when considering surgery, women are not fully aware of the pain and potentially fatal complications involved. According to the results of a study published in the January 2000 edition of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons' journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, between 1994 and 1998 the mortality rate from liposuction was higher than the deaths from car accidents in the US.
The Australian Centre for Cosmetic Surgery, however, mentions "bruising and swelling" as the only side effects of the procedure.
L'Image Cosmetic Surgery admits "there are risks in any surgical procedure" but asserts "no long term adverse effects have been reported as a result of liposuction".
It has long been known that the presence of breast implants makes the early detection of cancer very difficult, but again this is something cosmetic surgeons fail to disclose. Nor is there ever any mention of the potential, and quite probable, loss of all feeling in the nipple. Women are instead reassured by L'Image Cosmetic Surgery that "breast enlargement surgery improves self-esteem, makes a person more presentable and greatly enhances the outlook to life".
Claims of improved self-esteem are refuted by a recent study led by Dr David B. Sarwer from the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center and published in the January 2002 issue of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery.
The study concluded that women do not experience a change in body image or increased self-esteem after cosmetic surgery. While satisfied with the appearance of the specific feature that had been surgically altered, Sarwer's study found that women generally did not feel better about their overall appearance.
These findings confirm that women's low self-esteem and dissatisfaction with their bodies is not based on real physical defects that can be fixed with a nip and tuck.
Statistics from the Eating Disorders Awareness and Prevention organisation show that 80% of US women are dissatisfied with their appearance. The numbers are similarly high in Britain and Australia.
Every day of their lives, women are bombarded with sexist and unrealistic images telling them how they should look. Newspapers, magazines and TV all present semi-starved, made-up and surgically altered woman as the ideal. And these "beautiful" women always appear deliriously happy: happily shopping, happily cleaning their toilets, and happily laughing with friends and a spunky husband.
A woman is taught that if she "only" lost 10 kilos, or wore more makeup, or had her nose reconstructed, she would not encounter any more problems in her life.
Yet a recently operated-on woman will most likely become dissatisfied with another aspect of her body.
In her 1992 book The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolf declares: "If women suddenly stopped feeling ugly, the fastest-growing medical specialty would be the fastest dying." Of course this won't happen without a direct challenge to the capitalist economic system, which relies on the multi-billion dollar cosmetic surgery industry, 90% of whose clients are women. It also depends on the associated multi-billion dollar diet, exercise, cosmetics and fashion industries that are also created out of women's artificially constructed insecurities.
More importantly, women who spend their time recovering from unnecessary surgery, who lack energy and concentration due to excessive dieting, and who are preoccupied with feelings of guilt and self-hatred are not likely to be able to focus on understanding that it is the social system which oppresses them.
In the 1970s the women's liberation movement was broad, united and powerful. It had enough political and ideological weight to counter the constant media barrage of sexist images. The movement declared that what women think is more important than how they look. Slogans like "Don't diet, riot!" and "My ideal weight is whatever I weigh", were widely used. Women involved in and influenced by the movement were able to develop higher self-esteem, they were politically active and felt empowered and confident.
A similarly strong and active women's liberation movement will be needed to destroy the ridiculous notion that it is okay for a woman to be cut up for no medical reason, and have plastic inserted into her body or parts of her healthy flesh sucked out. We especially need to discredit the idea that this is what a woman must do, if she is to be accepted and loved.
BY LISA LINES
[The author is a member of the socialist youth organisation Resistance.]
From Â鶹´«Ã½ Weekly, March 6, 2002.
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